Two Feet Standing on a Principle
by tore-my-yellow-dress
Summary: "You know what I want, Alicia? I want to be able to look at you and it not hurt." Tag to Goliath and David.


**It's TGW Sunday! Spoilers for Goliath and David, but will probably be AU after episode airs. Slightly NSFW. Credit to dear Sab for giving me some of the idea! Hope you enjoy!**

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The courthouse is ominously quiet, almost as if the hushed whispers of the passerby in the hallways are intentional soundings. People are looking at her as she leaves the courtroom. Critics of a show never meant to be put to the big screen. It's just that he had started picking at her fresh scabs, and she had rushed home for a change in battle armor, and somewhere in between there was fire and brimstone of loaded looks and twenty years.

They'd almost been held in contempt.

The judge had compared them to law students. She'd wanted to laugh at the remark, an ugly thing that wouldn't leave the back of her throat for how it choked her. So she'd swallowed it back, positioned her weight into the balls of her feet, sweating in her high heels. Chest heaving with exertion, the flutter of something beating its broken wings against her rib cage, something like hope; a dying thing.

He says her name like a dirty word nowadays.

And that shouldn't make any difference, shouldn't have anything to do with the price of tea in China or the way she views herself, but somehow it does, when he's telling the court what kind of a lawyer she is, claiming he knows all her ethical indiscretions; somehow it makes a difference that he won't even spare a glance in her direction.

Maybe because she can remember a time when he could barely take his eyes off her.

She's always had a knack for running, so she'd tried, shoved her pride into a box and hired the movers. Her poker face always intact, a husband with a title, two beautiful children, and it was going to be her name as first billing, her _life_. She was going to be _on top_, the vantage point to be able to see every wrong doing she'd ever done, every betrayal, but knowing she'd also be able to see just beyond the distance. When she'd made the decision two months ago, it had been with full knowledge that within four, five years, he would have a wife, maybe even a baby girl who'd have him wrapped around her little finger-

But no, _no. _

Suddenly he's there, in her face, his jawline casting a shadow on her confidence, filling her with the dread of it all, the dread of having to go against him again and again, the same movie. He'd said they were on a merry-go-round, but it's more Ferris wheel. Like highs and lows- the way he says _Mrs. Florrick _and the way he'd whisper her name when they made love.

It's all there, some kind of Hiroshima. He is always ticking inside of her.

Alicia doesn't know, anymore, which of the two of them is holding the trigger between spite bent fingers. Seconds away from explosion, too near to the end for things like laughter or forgiveness. Alicia's intentions were pure. She had just wanted to set him free, because despite her reputation as Saint Alicia with her tactful stability, her hands weren't wide enough to hold everything at once. She thought he'd understand that she couldn't juggle anymore, that it was all tearing her apart. His love was already a selfish thing, so it fell to the wayside when held next to priorities. None of it fair.

The pink suit feels cheap.

It clings to her form, stained with lies and bloodied memories. Once something, once beautiful, but her shotgun mouth did all the work in making it an excuse, reducing it to a syllable, and now everything is ruining in front of her eyes and all she can do it watch, wear the pink suit, wear her heart and smile like she's not affected.

She thinks she might burn it once she gets home.

Her stride stops abruptly at the elevator, and she slams a button.

Then, Alicia Florrick freezes. Out of her peripheral, she senses he's within feet of her, there, always there, in her face, magnetic, protons and electrons and everything they should never have been, shouldn't still be. She thinks on it for approximately two seconds: whether or not to continue waiting an extra eleven or move. Fight or flight.

The thought of them being in a limited amount of space, so close, it makes something within her twist and cry out. Aching. Afraid.

Alicia turns on her heel. Decides to take the stairs.

Runs.

/

She doesn't, in a million years, expect him to follow her. But he does, like he has before, like he has with dragging himself into cases against the firm, making friends with her enemies, and she isn't ready to think of him as her _enemy, _just needs to recognize him as a file in the back of her mind labeled _things I do not think about unless alone. _But suddenly she's ten steps down the stairwell, and the door out to the landing slams. Alicia stops, one flight down.

Looks up at him.

"Will," she acknowledges, a lowered octave, almost mute, lips pressed into a thin line.

His expression is all snake, eyes wide and unassuming, the curl of his lip the only thing belying he has teeth to him; that he isn't afraid to bite. Contrary to popular belief, he's always been better at pretending than she has. Always.

"Hey, just wanted to catch you on your way out," he throws innocently, never afraid to poke a bear. "Wanted to remind you that once we start negotiations tomorrow morning, we won't be settling for anything less than what the court has authorized you to give us. No _gymnastics, _alright?"

Her teeth grind together so hard it sends a shockwave of white through her jaw. Fingers constrict around the strap of her purse until her knuckles turn bone. He's rubbing it in her face.

And suddenly, it's all too much.

Something within her _snaps. _A rubber band pulled too tight.

He watches her expression shift from her calmly constructed façade to this, something he's only seen in the photographs taken just after the scandal first broke, Alicia protecting her children against the swarm of reporters. A storm in her eyes.

The words come easily to her, because they're so fueled by the aura of arrogance he extends. "You are," the syllables are grinding. She pauses, closing her eyes, and then opening them again to stare up at him, nearly snarling with conviction. "-_pathetic_."

The words hang there for a moment, because truth be told, she can't fathom that she actually had the gall to say them. He? He's just trying to recover, because it feels a little like she's just punched him in the throat. But that's only kindle to the burn, an edge in his gut overtaking, defending whatever he has left- and he doesn't have her anymore, so all he's got is this self-worth.

Alicia already took his heart. Will won't let Alicia take this from him too.

"I'm pathetic?" he scoffs, starting down three stairs before leaning against the railing. "Are you hearing yourself? Pathetic is you being incapable of succeeding without your husband's name."

Alicia goes pale, like she's been slapped, and all at once she has a sense of clarity, some vague recognition of them being wild things, snapping at each other to gain ground. Wounding each other in the process. And she's tired, she's exhausted, the kind of fatigue that makes her entire body ache with the need to collapse inward, recede, lay down her weapon.

"_Stop it, Will," _Alicia growls, lip quivering.

He's down the next seven steps quicker than she can think to move away, inches away from touching her. She can feel the air from his lips mingling between them, rough with the way he's heaving.

His tone is deadly. "Or what, Mrs. Florrick? What will you do? Send your husband after me?"

It feels like a lifetime passes, them standing there, him waiting for her to say something, anything.

When her eyes begin to sting, she squeezes them shut, her entire face contorting in repression. Will inhales sharply. He hadn't been expecting _this. _Still, he waits for her to speak. He doesn't take pity on her, even if she is about to cry. Another time, another place, and he would have wanted to soothe her with assurances, kiss her worries away. That time is no more.

She doesn't open her eyes until she is sure she has a handle on herself.

Regardless, her eyes are shining, throat thick with defeat.

"Will, what do you want from me?"

He turns on his heel, eyes rolling on instinct, unable to push down the keeling disappointment that licks at him. She should know, and she doesn't. It's a dilemma, because on the one hand he wants it all to be intentional- he wants her to be wicked, have plotted it all since the moment she leaned over a barstool and told him it would be and exceptional moment, until today, until she labeled them as something dirty and passed it off as nothing. He wants it to be a meaningful blow, because if it isn't-

If she really broke his heart, and didn't realize it, then-

Then he never really mattered at all to her, even a little bit. And she was his whole world.

Something about that whole line of thinking makes him want to vomit.

So he walks away, attempts to, until-

"_Will. _What do you want? Do you want Chum Hum back? Do you want me to say I'm sorry? Because I'm not. I'm not-

He spins around so quickly she flinches away, and he _hates _that, hates that she doesn't trust him enough to know he would never physically harm her, a part of him aches that she really doesn't know him at all. In the same moment, he wants to grab her by her shoulders and shake her, wants to scream.

"You know what I want, Alicia?"

"What?" she juts her bottom lip out, and he wants to kiss her, wants to sink to his knees and ask her why, wants to beg her to come back to him; part of him even wants to slap her.

"I want to be able to look at you and it not hurt."

She recoils.

Looks down at her feet, and he almost, almost walks away again, until she asks him, sounding every bit as tormented as he feels, "Don't you know?"

She meets his eyes, desperately trying to convey how she feels in a single look. Her hair falling across her cheek, a lone tear begins to run.

"Don't you know this is killing me too?"

Gravity has never been more tremulous.

His wide palms wrap around her forearms, her purse clattering to the floor as he backs her against the wall. Sorely reminiscent of two years ago, of love and loss and all those dead things she only thinks about when she's alone. They kiss.

There's nothing gentle about it.

It's all teeth and tongue and whips, no decency, his hands coming up to fist her hair, makes her wince at the way he takes her lower lip between his pearly whites and bites. She tastes blood, moans low.

She's missed the way he tastes, every fiber of her being soaking in the little details, his spicy cologne, the way his skin feels against her own. She never wants to leave this moment, for fear that is will all fall apart again, capitulating into the dive she knows they'll take. Alicia pulls back from his mouth to form a protest, but he stops her, something hard and burning in his voice.

"I want _you," _he growls, readjusting their positions to slam her harder into the drywall.

It makes her feel suspended in need. Alicia nods shakily, all the permission needed.

Not bothering to unzip her skirt, he simply hikes it up her waist. It's dangerous like this, in the stairwell. They could be caught any moment. But those thoughts are fleeting, and his palms are rough. He shoves down her panty hose and the air is cold against her skin, his hot tongue licking a line up and down the pale column of her throat.

He palms her through the lace of her panties, feels how wet she is and gasps at the way she's rubbing him through his slacks, her own attentions going to his belt and the quickest possible way to rid him of it. Will pushes aside her underwear, runs his fingers through her curls and wetness.

Alicia goes limp, metal of his fly resting against her nails, body bucking at the pleasure of simply being touched. It's not that she'd compare Peter and Will, never in a million years, but it's easy to tell the difference between a slow burn and fireworks. _. _Will begins to rub her clit harshly, even as she's rushing to rid him of his pants, down with his boxer and-

She takes him in her hand, rubs her thumb through the wetness pooling at the tip at the same moment he decides to flick her clit. Her eyelashes flutter; his nostrils flare.

Will hoists one leg up around his waist, rubbing the smooth skin of her thigh and then reaching down with his other hand to position himself, to slide deep. She doesn't breathe, because of how much it is, how he fills her. It's almost painful. Almost.

But he doesn't stop, doesn't give her time to adjust, and maybe that's what makes it hurt more.

Will fucks her in short, powerful thrusts, slamming his hips until they're both painting. She's close from the mere contact of his cock at just the right angle, but not close enough. Each time she feels herself build she's pulled back because of all the details she wants to take in, remember. Because this might be the last time, this might be the only time she's able to see him, his jaw set in desperation, his eyes wild with something other than pain and fury.

She kisses him when he comes, hands reaching up to hold his head to her, basking in the way his hips stutter, at the way he twitches and comes inside of her. The sound of his groan is enough.

"Leesh," he murmurs, when he realizes she didn't_- but it's enough_, that even though she's gone and ruined everything he still reaches down, their bodies interlocked still, and thumbs her clit until she's writhing, muffling a scream into his suit jacket. They're sweaty, smell like sex.

And she isn't crying, not really.

Will promptly goes back to reality.

When his eyes grow distant, and he pulls out of her, dripping between them, it's a punch to the gut. He tucks himself back into his pants, pieces himself back together. Alicia braces her arm against the wall to hold herself up. They'll be bruises on her thigh, tomorrow. She'll be sore for days.

Quaking, she moves the pink skirt bunched around her hips, tries to smooth her hair best she can.

She can still taste him in her mouth, even as he's finishing buckling his belt.

"Will," she starts, but he stops her. She's almost glad. She wouldn't know what to say, anyway.

Too much.

"I'll see you tomorrow," he tells her.

Her gaze snaps to his retreating form as she leans down to gather the contents spilled when her purse hit the floor. He's trying to leave, but his sentiment makes her eyebrow raise, makes her dizzy. "That's it?" she asks, and if her voice sounds shrill it's only for him to hear.

He pauses, just shy of the fourth step down. Eyes cold, colder than they've ever been. She'd prefer anger to this, hatred. This is worse. So much worse. "I don't associate with women I bang."

Alicia Florrick's eyes are wide, staring at the pattern of the floor. The seconds tick by, could be hours. She listens, and quietly, probably not even something she was meant to hear, he admits something to himself, to her.

"I wish I'd never met you."

The door two flights down slams with finality.

Alicia is still crouched, hands hovered over a tube of lipstick. Her thighs are sticky, chafing.

She shatters.


End file.
